Abstract
The social sciences in Latin America have always had a special connection with the study and analysis of the place of emotions in the social structuration processes. The aim of this article is to offer a synthetic exposition of some inquiries about emotions and the politics of sensibilities in Latin America, emphasizing those that are being felt in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. To achieve this objective, first we offer a synthesis of the theoretical and methodological points that will guide the interpretation; then we draw on pre-existing inquiries and surveys which allow us to capture the state of sensibilities before and during the pandemic in the region; and finally some conclusions are presented. The work is based on a multi-method approach, where qualitative and quantitative secondary and primary data are articulated in tandem.
Introduction: Methodological and theoretical starting points
Emotions are closely related to the time and space in which they are experienced. Love, hatred, joy and sadness emerge, occur and dissolve with different intensities according to the time/space in which they take place. Climates, forms of settlements, and housing structures inspire and provoke different emotions as well as different ways of expressing them. However, if the emotions are closely related to the context/environment and/or interaction horizon in which they are experienced, they are also tributaries of their indeterminacy and complexity. Emotions cannot invariably be attributed to a single ‘cause/motivation’ from which a unique and determined sense can be derived, and at the same time they are the result of the ‘cobordism’ of a constellation of previous interactions between multiple factors.
From Ibn Khaldun (1377) with his concept of group feeling, passing through one of the founding mothers of Latin American critical thought such as Prudencia Ayala (1925) and her examination of the connection between love and collective practices, until reaching the current discussions on the content of the cultural politics of emotions (Ahmed, 2007), it is possible to see a geopolitical and geocultural connection between sensations, emotions and sensibilities. It is in this context that an inquiry into the emotions and politics of sensibilities in Latin America today presents itself as a pertinent challenge.
There are diverse ways to frame the theoretical orientations on which the studies on the body/emotion are based. A possible one, having in mind the Latin American context and without intent of exhaustiveness, is the following: (a) a line of work connected to Foucault and his concepts of control, discipline and technologies of the self; (b) an approach connected to Bourdieu and his notions of habitus, body hexis and social fields; (c) a set of investigations in the field of biopolitics referring to Esposito and Agamben on the one hand, and to Negri and Hardt on the other; and (d) the investigations that, from a post-colonial vision, take up corporality on a track toward anti-hegemonic thought.
In recent years a series of volumes about bodies and emotions have been published, gathered from history, anthropology, sociology and/or transdisciplinary perspectives. Several prestigious academic journals have published issues dedicated to the subject, which point in the direction of two phenomena: the importance that the problem has gained in society and its scientific relevance.
There follows next an outline of the themes that appear in a selection of collections/monographs, which indicate, at least partially, the contexts of the disciplinary fields dedicated to bodies/emotions in the region at present (Aguiluz-Ibargüen, 2014b; Bidaseca et al., 2012; Correa Gómez and Landaeta Sepúlveda, 2009; Escobar and Cabra, 2013; López Sánchez et al., 2016; Marquez Valderrama, 2012).
A different perspective toward understanding the theoretical traditions that usually support the studies in this field of inquiry is to turn to the classic authors on the theme: Nietzsche, Merleau-Ponty, Spinoza and Marx. An additional view is gained in the presence of contemporary authors of sociology such as Goffman, Simmel and Elias, from the philosophy of Derrida, Butler and Deleuze, or the psychoanalysis of Freud, Lacan and Zizek.
As is often seen in Latin America as well as in other regions of the world, body(ies) and society(ies) are systematic objects of research where affectivity and sensibility are strongly present. Along the same lines, social studies regarding the emotions have also been the object of diverse treatments, from Darwin through Sartre and arriving at the proposals of Collins, Hochschild, Kemper and/or Illouz, to mention just a few of their best-known reference points.
Smith and Schneider (2009) maintain that the numerous theories on emotions can be grouped within a tripartite classification: determinism, social constructionism and social interaction. Gross and Barrett (2011), with the intent to evaluate the differences of perspective on the ‘generation’ and/or ‘regulation’ of emotions, classify current perspectives for studying emotions into four broad areas: models of basic emotions, evaluative models, models of psychological construction and models of social construction.
The present article is founded on the convergence of critical theory, critical hermeneutics and critical-dialectic realism on the one hand, and on the encounter between the sociology of the body/emotions, ideology criticism and studies of collective action and social conflict, on the other. The research problem to which this article refers responds to the question: what are the emotions and politics of sensibilities in Latin America today? The response was developed based on a multi-method design where a qualitative and quantitative strategy was applied, and secondary and primary data were used. This implies the articulation of various theoretical approaches and methodological strategies whose relevance and affinity with the research problem are made explicit in each case. This articulation work was carried out with a view to answering the question asked.
At present, although there are a variety of ways to understand the meaning of ‘using’ a multi (mixed)-method strategy, a broad consensus can also be observed in this regard. Along the same lines, it is possible to find diverse researchers: Bazeley (2011), Jeanty and Hibel (2011) and Johnson and Onwuegbuzie (2004); and also Molina Azorín and Cameron (2010), Greene et al. (1989) and Tashakkari and Teddlie, (1998) who all, in one way or another, maintain that mixed methods include and combine at least one quantitative and one qualitative method in the approach to an investigation, and this means mixing techniques, approaches, concepts and languages of each method in a single study.
In a broad sense it is necessary here to offer some clarification of the concepts underlying a sociology of sensibilities.
We consider that humans know, build and rebuild the world in and through our bodies and emotions. The most elemental form of alluded contact is the social construction of the connections between perceptions, sensations and emotions: this builds a tripod that allows us to understand where sensibilities are founded. Thus, a set of impressions impact in the ways that subjects ‘exchange’ with the socio-environmental context. Such impressions of objects, phenomena, processes and other agents structure the perceptions that subjects accumulate and reproduce. Perception, from this perspective, constitutes a naturalized way of organizing the set of impressions that are given in an agent.
This weaving of impressions configures the sensations that ‘produce’ what can be called the internal and external world: social, subjective and ‘natural’ worlds. Such configurations are formed in a dialectic tension between impressions, perceptions and their results, that give sensations the ‘meaning’ of a surplus or excess. Therefore, it puts them closer and beyond such dialectic.
Sensations, as a result and as antecedent of perceptions, locate emotions as an effect of the processes of adjudication and correspondence between perceptions and sensations. Emotions, understood as the consequences of sensations, can be seen as a puzzle that becomes action and effect of feeling something or feeling oneself. Emotions are rooted in the ‘state of feeling’ the world that allows the sustaining of perceptions. These are associated with socially constructed forms of sensations.
At the same time, organic and social senses also enable what seems unique and unrepeatable, as are individual sensations, and elaborate the ‘un-perceived work’ of in-corporating social elements turned into emotions. Sensations, as a result and antecedent of perceptions, give way to emotions which can be seen as the manifestation of the action and effect of feelings. They are rooted in the states of feeling the world that build perceptions associated with socially constructed forms of sensations.
Consequently, the politics of bodies (i.e. the strategies that a society accepts in order to offer a response to the social availability of individuals) is a chapter – and not the least important chapter – in the instruction manual of power. These strategies are tied and ‘strengthened’ by the politics of emotions that tend to regulate the construction of social sensibility.
Politics of emotions require regulating and making bearable the conditions under which social order is produced and reproduced. In this context, we understand that social bearability mechanisms are structured around a set of practices that have become embodied and that are oriented towards a systematic avoidance of social conflict.
The forms of sociability and experience are strained and twisted as if contained in a Moebius strip along with the sensibilities that arise from regulatory devices and the aforementioned mechanisms. The need to distinguish and link the possible relations between sociability, experience and social sensibilities becomes crucial at this point. Sociability is a way of expressing the means by which agents live and coexist interactively. Experience is a way of expressing the meaning gained while being in physical proximity with others, as a result of experiencing the dialogue between the individual body, the social body and the subjective body, on the one hand; and the natural appropriation of bodily and social energies, on the other. For the body to be able to reproduce experience and sociability, it is necessary that bodily energy is an object of production and consumption. Such energy can be understood as the necessary force to preserve the state of ‘natural’ affairs in a systemic functioning. At the same time, the social energy shown through the social body is based on bodily energy, and refers to the allocation processes of such energy as the basis of the conditions of movement and action. Thus, sensations are distributed according to the specific forms of bodily capital; and the body’s impact on sociability and experience shows a distinction between the body image, body skin, and body movement.
Employing this framework, this article seeks to produce a picture of the state of emotions and sensibilities in Latin America in the current context of pandemic, drawing on previous analyses and diagnoses. A set of quantitative and qualitative studies have been selected that, carried out before and during the experiences of the pandemic, allow us to outline the information available around ‘diagnoses’ about emotions in the continent. To articulate the differences between the objectives and strategies of the different sources analysed here, a multi-method approach was selected whose common axis was that each study will allow us to answer the question: ‘What are the politics of existing sensibilities?’
Expressed in a synthetic way, it is important to point out that the systematization carried out has been elaborated by understanding emotions as practices, which are constructed as a result of the connections between impressions, perceptions and sensations inscribed in specific sociabilities, experiences and sensibilities. These politics of sensibilities are associated with a moment in the political economy of morality of social structuring processes; processes that so far this century have consisted in the consecration of normalized societies in immediate enjoyment through consumption.
As we have pointed out elsewhere (Scribano, 2020a; Scribano and De Sena, 2020), the pandemic operates as a magnifying glass that allows us to observe what already exists much better and as an amplifier of the voices often not heard in the structural conditions of Latin America. These two conditionalities have been used as a framework, both for the selection of the cited studies and for the proposed analysis.
Emotions in Latin America: Before and since the COVID-19 pandemic
As already noted, this section seeks to provide a picture of the politics of sensibilities and emotions prevalent in Latin America, trying to show the situation before and during the pandemic under the assumption that this extraordinary situation allows us to capture the previously existing realities more fully and makes it possible to ask questions about the future. The section is divided according to the answers to two simple questions about what could be observed before, and what is seen today during the pandemic.
To offer an approximation of what we knew before the pandemic we have synthesized: (a) in a first step, the place of the Latin American countries in the Love World Index, from which, although it is still in the process of publication, we have been able to access the initial data, about the perception of gender differences/inequalities in terms of the position (and condition) of men, and discrimination in connection with the evaluation of multiethnic coexistence and the reception of migrants; (b) in a second step, data on interpersonal trust and the ‘reasons’ with which people associate their happiness are analysed; (c) a third step that examines how positive and negative experiences are experienced; and then (d), an identification of which emotions are associated with collective action connected to filial love and the associated conflict matrices.
The analysis of the situation during the COVID-19 pandemic is carried out in two moments: (a) presenting studies by individual country: Chile (based on discussion groups), Uruguay (survey), Colombia (survey) and Brazil (ethnography); and (b) showing some results of quantitative and qualitative studies (digital creative experiences) in a group of countries in the region.
What was there before the COVID-19 pandemic in Latin America?
An approach to the study of emotions and sensibilities can be taken from the logic of social love and reciprocity. Very recently a group of Italian colleagues – Iorio et al. (2020) 1 – have undertaken to establish a Love World Index, drawing on information from 53 countries across the world.
Regarding specifically the countries in Latin America, in 9th place is Chile with a rating of 35 on the World Love Index; in 16th place is Colombia (32); then in position 21 is Haiti (31.6); position 35 is occupied by Argentina (27.8), position 38 by Brazil (27.3), position 43 by Peru (25.5), and position 53 by Ecuador (22.4) (Iannaccone, 2020).
As is easy to see, beyond the possible interpretations, it is clear that a diverse and plural emotional geopolitics is being constituted on the planet and in the region, which suggests the unequal distributions of reciprocity practices that actually exist in Latin America, but at the same time confirms the presence of such practices.
Another study that is helpful for our purposes here is the survey conducted by the Pew Research Center (2020a) 2 called ‘Worldwide Optimism about Future of Gender Equality: Even as Many See Advantages for Men’. The study’s objective is to identify the social sensibilities about problems that make visible women’s social movements, and to elaborate the reception of the transformations of the place of women in the world. The work took place in 11 countries, including Brazil, Mexico and Argentina, and aimed to show the changes that had occurred between 2010 and 2019 (see Table 1).
‘More people now say men have a better life than women in their country’.
Source: Own elaboration from Spring 2019 Survey Data, Global Attitudes Survey. Q59.
In the Latin American countries in the survey, respondents say that it is men who have a better chance of having a better life. Faced with the question on the feeling practice as a reflection of a ‘better life’, the tension between the logic of difference and the logic of inequality appears again. To evaluate this information, it must be remembered, once again, that emotions are practices that participate in a set of sociabilities, experiences and sensibilities.
If we look at diversity from another angle, we draw on an investigation also carried out by the Pew Research Center 3 (2020b) on ‘Attitudes Toward Diversity’, that is, toward different races, ethnicities and nationalities. The question selected here refers to whether the increase in living alongside, sharing life in society, with a diversity of race, ethnicity and other groups, improves, worsens or has no effect on making your country a better place to live. Results for three Latin American countries are shown in Table 2.
People’s perception/opinion about the increase in diversity in their country (in %).
Source: Own elaboration based on Mobile Technology & Its Social Impact Survey (2018). Q40: ‘Attitudes toward diversity in 11 emerging economies’.
If we concentrate on reading the mean, for 42% ‘it would be a better place’, and if we add 30% for ‘there would be no difference’, and 22% for it ‘would make the place worse to live in’, the scenario becomes rather complex, in terms of the equation of more diversity with a better life.
If we add, ‘there would be no difference’ to ‘it would be a worse place’, it is possible to perceive (beyond the fact that the survey wants to show that the conditions for diversity have been improved) that there is a majority between indifference and deterioration, that people would not feel comfortable, that they do not see that their country would improve with the presence of more diversity. Indifference about the ‘others’ can be a way of naturalizing social disadvantages and also the experience of the ‘other’ as a threat (Scribano, 2020b).
It can be confirmed, in general, there is an increased negative view regarding migrants in the percentages presented in the information from Mexico and Colombia. 4
The survey report presents a graphic titled ‘In general, negativity toward migrants. In Colombia and Mexico’, and shows the percentages of people who have a favourable/unfavourable view of Central Americans fleeing to Mexico, and on the other side, of migrants living in Colombia. Looking at Mexico, 48% of people are not in favour of Central Americans fleeing to Mexico and 43% have a favourable view. On the other hand, in Colombia, 54% are not in favour of migrants living in their country and 42% take a favourable view.
In this first step, with regard to the pre-pandemic, it is possible to note that there is an uneven geopolitics of reciprocity, and an increase in experiences of gender inequality and racial discrimination. Thus, it is possible to see how the logic of such experiences is directly related to the life lived as inscribed in a politics of sensibilities. In this framework, it is possible to highlight that in the region sociability, experience and sensibilities are affected by a problematic acceptance of diversity. Before the pandemic, as this information shows, at least partially, we were experiencing disparities of reciprocity, gender inequality and racial discrimination.
A second step that can be taken is to analyse the questions on interpersonal trust in the annual Latinbarómetro survey.
The information about ‘Interpersonal Trust’ shows the levels of trust and non-trust in Latin America. People answered a question with three different options: (a) most people can be trusted, (b) you can never be careful enough with others, (c) don’t know/no answer (Latinobarómetro, 2018) (see Table 3).
Percentage of ‘interpersonal trust’ in Latin America. a
‘Would you say that most people can be trusted or that one can never be careful enough in dealing with others?’
Source: Own elaboration from Latinbarómetro (2018).
Taking into account all the countries involved, from a sample of 20,204 persons, 14.2% of people answered that most people can be trusted, 82.8% that you can never be careful enough with others, and 3% were don’t knows or no answer given.
It is evident that the degree of mistrust is high in all countries; there may be some countries where this is less so than in others, but in those places where distrust is lower, the percentage of ‘don’t knows/no answer’ increases.
A conclusion, at least provisional, would be: there is a tendency toward mistrust. The situation is critical: trust, which is one of the basic emotions in the construction of sociability, is, to say the least, low in Latin America in general.
Another element that we will take into account is the World Report on Happiness (Helliwell et al., 2020), especially to look at the ‘reasons’ people associate with their happiness. This study presents a ranking of Happiness between the years 2017 and 2019. There are different factors which are used to measure happiness: GDP per capita, social support, healthy life expectancy, freedom to make life choices, generosity and perceptions of corruption.
For Latin America, we find: in 15th place in terms of happiness, Costa Rica; Mexico is at 24; Uruguay is placed at 26; Guatemala is 29th; Brazil is 33rd; El Salvador is at 44; Panama at 36; Chile at 39; Colombia is at 44; and Nicaragua is at 46. In 55th position is Argentina; Honduras is at 56; Ecuador at 58; Peru at 63; Bolivia at 65; Paraguay at 67; the Dominican Republic is at 68; Venezuela is at 99; and Haiti is in 142nd place.
Looking further, a more than interesting analytical axis becomes evident: the reason why people say they are happy is their experiences of close social relationships, friends, family, and this is a very important state: it is a positive emotion, happiness are very important.
In light of the information on happiness and mistrust there emerges an emotional paradox: we were experiencing, on the one hand, a high degree of mistrust (or at least a low confidence), and the happiness we experience is based on close relationships, relationships with those we trust. That means that the Latinbarómetro option ‘one can never be careful enough in dealing with others’ forms a coalition with the fact of experiencing happiness from the social relationships in which one trusts.
The effects of proximity are undoubtedly important in Latin America as we have reflected in our study on filial love (Scribano, 2020c), but here another band appears, to refer back to the metaphor of the Moebius strip, that stresses happiness/trust.
A third step is to pay attention to another aspect that is relevant in Latin America, which is expressed in a spectrum of positive and negative experience. In this sense, we will see what we are going to call the verification of a structural disconnection: the observation that greater emotional experience (living more experiences) and more good experiences (more ‘positive’) occur in countries with lower income levels.
The Gallup World Poll 2019, about the most and least emotional countries, produced data on the intensity and the positivity/negativity of experienced emotions, supporting the view that Latin America countries continue to lead in positive experiences (see Tables 4 and 5).
The most and least emotional countries (average of all ‘yes’ responses in %).
Source: Own elaboration based on Gallup World Poll (2019).
Highest positive experiences worldwide.
Source: Own elaboration based on Gallup World Poll (2019).
The countries with the most positive experiences are poor, underdeveloped or with a low GDP, or with great inequality, which would invite further examination of both the questions and the answers in the survey. Beyond the theoretical and methodological differences that may arise, this inquiry opens up an interesting space for discussion about the proximity/distances between material living conditions and the sensibilities associated with them.
At this point it is easy to see that the politics of pre-pandemic sensibilities in the region were marked by differences in reciprocity, gender inequality and racial discrimination. We were experiencing a paradox: on the one hand, a high degree of distrust, and on other the happiness that we experience is based on the relationships of proximity, and alongside that is a structural disconnection between positive experiences and material conditions of existence.
From a qualitative perspective, and in connection with the structure of the politics of sensibilities, it is interesting here to observe one of the results of our digital ethnography on filial love and collective action in Latin America (Scribano, 2020c). Our investigation, carried out in six countries (Mexico, Guatemala, Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina and Chile), presented an overview of the relationship between emotions and collective action (see Table 6).
Filial love and collective action in Latin America.
Source: Own elaboration based on the experience of some of the collective actions investigated (see end notes for more details).
In the context of the objectives of this work, it is important to emphasize here the presence of sadness, suffering, pain, uncertainty, anger and fear as features of an emotional ecology harboured by the experience of collective organizations of the politics of current sensibilities.
As a synthesis of what has been analysed, it is possible to maintain that in our lives before the pandemic there were: reciprocity disparities, gender inequality and racial discrimination; experiences of emotional paradox between reasons of happiness and mistrust; structural disconnection between material conditions of existence/emotions; and fear and sadness.
It is very important to underline a key factor in understanding the politics of sensibilities that emerges from our study on filial love and collective action: there are hundreds of thousands of interstitial practices that daily deny the closed totality of the truth regime based on the game of ghosts and capitalist fantasies.
Now let’s see what is observed if the lens of the pandemic is applied from the information available on emotions since its appearance on the continent.
What emotions are experienced in a pandemic situation? A review by countries
This section will be presented in two moments, one that refers to some studies of individual countries (Chile, Colombia, Uruguay and Brazil), and another moment where some type of comparative information based on regional studies becomes evident. As has already been clarified, the argumentative strategy is supported by a multi-method plotting of information to allow an approach to emotions during the pandemic.
By country
Chile
In 2019, Chile was perhaps one of the countries in the region and in the world with the greatest social mobilization, which included social protests, cooperative actions and a diversity of associative practices, and it is also one of the most criticized governments for its handling of the pandemic. In this context, Mac-Clure et al. (2020) ask in a recent work, what happened to the emotions that emerged in Chile during a peak of social unrest on 18 October 2019? These are some of their reflections: 11
In the first place, fear was also present in the population during the social upheaval, but in a different way. There was an initial fear of violent events. . . . On the other hand, the fear of repression, also expressed by the participants, was counteracted by the massiveness of the public demonstrations and the positive feeling of finally moving things. Second, from the social revolt to the pandemic, the intensity of fear was reversed according to social classes. During the revolt of October 18, most of the people participating in the groups considered that the shareholder of large companies represented in one of the vignettes was very afraid. . . . On the other hand, during the pandemic, the interviewees indicated that due to their elders’ economic resources, this character was better protected from the threat of the virus, while people with fewer resources were the most vulnerable to the disease. (Mac-Clure et al., 2020: para. 6) Third, during the social upheaval, participants in the groups supported multiple social demands raised in the period. In the pandemic, with a multiple but more negative meaning for the participants, the fear extended beyond the threat to health, since they feared contagion, but also the loss of employment, income and status. This especially affected workers with fewer resources. (Mac-Clure et al., 2020: para. 6) Finally, the uncertainty during the pandemic strongly changed the perception of the future time. Although the social protests opened the hope of a better future for many, expressed in shared aspirations, these no longer appeared in the conversations between the members of the groups during the epidemic. (Mac-Clure et al., 2020: para. 7)
An important piece of information is the presence of caring practices and help with food during the pandemic that, according to the same study, emerged.
Fears and uncertainty appear as the axes of multiple experiences where 2019 and 2020 are systematically connected through the experiences of ‘confinement’ and the threat to life. Class inequalities, future prospects, and frustration regarding government actions make the Chilean experience an example of how suffering in a pandemic is directly connected with previous levels of tolerance to suffering.
Uruguay
Uruguay is an interesting example. It is considered in the media as a country whose health strategy against COVID-19 was successfully handled by a government that had only just assumed the leadership of the state a few weeks before the first case of contagion in the country.
A study was conducted by Bericat and Acosta (2020) on the emotional well-being 12 of the Uruguayan population, before and during COVID-19, where respondents were asked whether they had felt (a particular emotion) all or part of the time during the previous week. The results are shown in Table 7.
Index of emotional wellness.
Source: Own elaboration based on Monitor – Teams Consultants. (Survey base March 2020: 1110 cases. Survey base March/August 2019: 2418 cases.).
It is interesting to note that the emotional ecology in this analysis is ‘marked’ by sadness, being the emotion most emphatically mentioned in the current pandemic process. It is evident how the threat of the virus and the management of fear make people experience loneliness and depression more intensely. In ‘contradiction’ to the above, the same work notes the emergence of collective practices to mitigate the effects of the pandemic.
Colombia
IPSOS (2020) produced a report entitled ‘Emotional State of Colombians’. The effects of the coronavirus in daily life were investigated during the week of 31 March in a population of men and women aged 25 to 46 years old, married and single in four Colombian cites, in an effort to know in what phase of what the researchers call the ‘evolutionary phases of emotionality’ the population of the country was in. The report states that:
For this purpose, we are talking with people on our online platforms through discussion groups and following up on social networks that helps us find what people tell and share and that are evidence of mood and the emotionality of the moment. The result of this follow-up in our first week of isolation is mainly related to three emotions: anguish, uncertainty, and search for solidarity. (IPSOS, 2020: 2, emphasis in the original)
Three sides of the emotional ecology thus appear that in one way or another coincide with the rest of the countries, especially with what was mentioned above in relation Chile.
Brazil
An article by Mauro Koury (2020) on ethnographic work carried out in Brazil also finds the same combination of sadness and anxiety that we have been describing:
In all of them, the change in mood over the course of a day and over the days is expressed in an almost glaring way. The disposition fluctuates and easily can dominate the will and provoke feelings of sadness regarding the present and the lack of hope and perspectives about the future. In several cases narrated to me, quarantined life, anxiety and personal and collective fear are coated with a feeling of sadness. ‘Suffocated’, ‘muffled’ sadness so as not to embarrass yourself, nor to worry or embarrass others with whom you live. This contained sadness has led many interlocutors to narrate the repressed pain as unbearable, bordering, in many cases, on depression, and the desire to ‘disappear’, to ‘let the boat go through the waters that it wants’. The stifling of sadness amplifies the feeling of anguish associated with the guilt of wanting to escape the situation in which they are subsumed. The guilt of having wanted to leave one’s relations alone and having forced yourself to go along with them and take care of them, on the one hand. On the other hand, however, the sadness contained also compromises the networks of support with which they supported themselves collectively: at home, in the nostalgic narrative of the ‘street’, of being able to go out, of being able to have fun, of being able to go to work or school, among other “actions of free will”, in the meeting with neighbours and friends, or even from co-workers. (Koury, 2020: 19)
Various countries
Within the above framework in mind, we now turn to analyse studies that present information from various countries in the region, seeking to complete the picture of the prevailing emotional ecologies in the modifications of the politics of sensibilities.
First we present a survey conducted by the United Nations World Hunger Fund 13 of 41,000 people, across 9 countries, over 15 days in the first three months of the COVID-19 pandemic in the Americas. Of the respondents, 60% were male and 40% female, and they had an average age of 35 years. The survey includes the question ‘What’s your main worry?’ The answer selected the most was ‘Unemployment and loss of income’. After that, comes the ‘ability to cover food needs’, and in third place the ‘spread of fear’. In fourth place, people chose the answer ‘inability to cover essential needs’. The next three answers selected were at a similar level: first ‘concern about social isolation’, then ‘care for dependants’ and the last one ‘limitation on movement’.
In this context, the survey asked another question relevant to our objectives in this article: ‘In the past 30 days have you felt worried about not having enough food to eat?’ Of the responses, 69% were ‘yes’ and 31% were ‘no’.
The results paint a picture of fear: lack of employment, lack of income, fear of not being able to meet food needs, fear of the virus getting ‘out of control’. There is a direct connection between the experience of fear and the material conditions of existence.
In the pandemic, there emerges and/or becomes more acute what we can call fears of reproduction: fear of the relationship between caring and taking care of oneself, in the sense of not having the essentials, fear of the impossibility of securing sufficient food. This is something very interesting because they are atavistic fears, they are fears of reproduction. These are fears that have to do with life and death, not only because of COVID-19, but because of the consequences of the disease.
We will now review a regional survey of emotions produced by the coronavirus pandemic, carried out by Nathalie Folco (2020) of the Digital Division of Agora Public Affairs & Strategic Communications, and which is updated periodically. The public postings on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and from blog users in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Mexico and Peru about COVID-19 were analysed. We concentrate here on showing the variation between the period 23 March to 24 May 2020 (Table 8). 14
Percentage of expressed emotions in posts on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and among blog users in Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Chile, Mexico and Peru about COVID-19.
Source: Own elaboration based on Nathalie Folco (2020) of the Digital Division of Agora Public Affairs & Strategic Communications.
What is interesting about this paradox/tension between anger, joy, anxiety and compassion is that a much more varied palette of emotions opens up than the one we have been analysing so far, revealing emotions that until now we had not mentioned as part of the COVID-19 spectrum. For example, in total averages, joy is almost more frequently mentioned than anger: anger is directed against the virus, and the joy of being free from the virus is what the polling company uncovers and measures. Another interesting aspect is that there is no variation between the two periods, between March and April, and April and May.
The emotions closely associated with the pandemic are ones of uncertainty and ambivalence – between anger and joy, between compassion and sadness, between disappointment and hatred.
At the CIES (Centre for Research and Sociological Studies), we conducted an online survey (N = 2613) between March and June 2020 about the kind of emotions being felt about the virus in Latin America (Table 9).
Emotions about the virus, in Latin America.
Source: Own elaboration.
In first place, the emotion most feel about the virus is anxiety. Then comes fear. Third is calm, and in fourth place sadness. Then are mentioned other emotions, such as indifference, anger and hate, respectively. Most people who feel anxiety, fear, calm and indifference about the virus are between 25 and 34 years old, and between 35 and 44 years old. But among those who feel sadness, the majority are 55 years or older, or in the 25 to 34 age group.
In addition, there is another component to this anxiety: it occurs more among millennials. The pandemic is a great brake on the speed and intensity of the process that we have been studying for a long time regarding the consolidation of a society normalized in instant enjoyment through consumption, and this impacts, in the first instance, on young people.
In another investigation that we carried out at CIES, we sought to understand the predominant emotions among young students of social sciences in general, but especially sociology, regarding the restrictions imposed by quarantine or isolation that had been introduced and/or experienced in their countries. For these purposes, we carried out six Creative Digital Experiences (ECD) through the Zoom application in Spain, Mexico, Guatemala, Colombia, Chile and Peru. The ECD have a duration of approximately two hours and between 8 and 12 people participate. The following emotions emerged in all groups:
Uncertainty as an expression of ignorance about COVID-19, as a result of not being able to complete what was planned and as uncertainty of the duration of sanitary measures.
The daily experience of the ‘roller coaster feeling’ of going from euphoria, to stillness, to depression and then back to euphoria . . . repeated at least once a day.
The experience of various intensities of sadness, a feeling of confinement, frustration, anger, creating a painting of the world of discouragement.
The experience of being faced with an opportunity: of doing something that they had never been able to do, of expressing themselves in ways that they had not thought of before, of stopping doing things, of helping, of being valued for something, etc.
Finally, the feeling of reconstruction of family ties and definition of neighbour from among friends, loves, etc.
It is in this panorama of emotions that we can better understand what we have already stated: the common characteristics in terms of politics of sensibilities are fear, anxiety, uncertainty, anguish and sadness. The results available to us make up a painting of fear that we could call ‘fears of reproduction’. Uncertainty and its ambivalence finally emerge as central features of the experiences.
New politics on sensibilities?
When this article was first conceived, the COVID-19 pandemic did not exist and the planetary panorama in general, and Latin America in particular, was different. We are all experiencing the widespread feeling that we share a sensibility that hangs between catastrophe and opportunity. How the pandemic has already been endured here acts like a magnifying glass and impacts our senses and with it our emotions.
With the caveat of provisionality in articulating various sources of information from a multi-method perspective, it is possible to reconstruct some clues to describe the ‘emotional state’ of the people who live in Latin America. In the following 10 theses we synthesize the outstanding features of the politics of sensibilities in Latin America at present, with the aim to expand the space for discussion of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in the region.
In the first place the pandemic, by affecting the flow and density of consumption, has altered the widespread normalization in the immediate enjoyment that was being lived across the planet in general, and in Latin America in particular.
Second, a source of uncertainty has been the deepening and we witness the complex plot between mistrust and appreciation of proximity as the sustenance of happiness.
Third, and in connection with the above, experiences of sadness can be attributed to compulsory social distancing and health policies of isolation, which highlight the centrality of co-presence and the ‘place of the other’ in daily life.
Fourth, the same state practices mentioned have highlighted, made visible and given a ‘narrative’ to public politics as creators of emotions and especially politics of sensibilities.
Fifth, the uncertainty is connected with the clear intervention by states in the perception of time, in their discretion in setting the dates for the start and end of the lockdowns, dispatch of protective equipment and the like.
Sixth, the fear of the loss of minimal reproduction connects with a politics of sensibilities elaborated between the structural sensations of precariousness, uncertainty and abandonment as an emotional ecology.
In the seventh place, the presence of anger, hatred and frustration create an emotional ecology that silently undermines the social energies by which those who comply with the isolation measures are nurtured, causing the ‘feeling of fatigue’.
Eighth, the experience of increased precariousness, uncertainty and risk shows more clearly and closely their existence as features of the sensibilities of capitalist globalization.
In ninth place, the expression by the respondents and the interviewees in the various inquiries cited in relation to tranquillity and the hiatus in activities appearing as an opportunity for a different ‘personal’ life.
In tenth place, the predisposition to collaboration and the practices of sharing open a path towards hope through love as a collective action that allows us to understand the pandemic as an opportunity for change.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
I want to express my gratitude for the comments and support of Maximiliano Korstanje, Majid Yar, Ana Cervio, Victoria Sordini and Aldana Boragnio
Declaration of conflicting interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Notes
Author biography
) and a Principal Researcher at the National Council for Scientific and Technical Research of Argentina. He is also the Director of the Study Group on Sociology of Emotions and Bodies, in the Gino Germani Research Institute, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Buenos Aires. He also serves as Coordinator of Working Group 26 on Bodies and Emotions of the Latin American Association of Sociology (ALAS) and as Vice-President of the Thematic Group 08 Society and Emotions of the International Sociological Association (ISA).
